Faith and state. British policy responses to Islamist extremism

El extremismo islámico ha sido objeto de intenso escrutinio global desde septiembre de 2001. Muchos Estados han respondido al desafío del terrorismo islámico con una estrategia antiterrorista común. Tal estrategia incluye políticas genéricas anti violenciIslamist extremism has been the focus of intensive global scrutiny since September 2001. Many states have responded to the challenge of Islamic terrorism with a common anti terrorist strategy. Those policies include generic anti violence policies that co

States with a history of undemocratic regimes in the 20th century are more likely to repress racist movements.

Why do some liberal democracies repress racist associations, while others tolerate their existence? Erik Bleich outlines the results of a study into the different factors that affect a state’s response to racist political parties and movements. He finds that the most significant predisposing factor to states placing restrictions on racist associations is a history of undemocratic regimes in the 20th century. The trigger for a country choosing to pass or enforce such provisions varies, however, with external pressure from international bodies, and a rise in domestic racist incidents being two of the most common precipitating events

Faith and state. British policy responses to 'Islamist' extremism / Fe y Estado. La política británica responde al extremismo 'Islamista'

Islamist extremism has been the focus of intensive global scrutiny since September 2001. Many states have responded to the challenge of Islamic terrorism with a common anti terrorist strategy. Those policies include generic anti violence policies that consciously avoided to mention Islam; repressive policies that explicitly target Muslims extremists and policies that seek to integrate Muslims by soft or compelling methods. The article explores these policies in Britain

Frühe profibrotische Veränderungen nach Ischämie/Reperfusion in der Niere

https://doi.org/10.3390/life14081031Ischämie/Reperfusion (I/R) ist bei Nierentransplantationen unvermeidbar, verursacht akutes Nierenversagen (AKI) und wirkt sich unmittelbar auf das Ergebnis aus. Darüber hinaus führt es zu chronischen Veränderungen, wie der fibrotischen Umgestaltung des Transplantats. Wir untersuchten die pro-fibrotische Signalübertragung nach I/R und konzentrierten uns dabei auf die Komplementkomponente und den Rezeptor C5a/C5aR1 sowie die Wechselwirkung zwischen Makrophagen und Tubuli. Hierzu unterzogen wir männliche Dark-Agouti-Ratten einer I/R und entnahmen ihre Nieren 10 Minuten, 6 Stunden, 24 Stunden, 3 Tage, 5 Tage und 8 Wochen nach der Reperfusion. Die Entwicklung einer Nierenfibrose wurde durch den Nachweis der Proteine Vimentin (VIM) und α-Smooth-Muscle-Actin (α-SMA) sowie von Kollagen mittels Immunhistochemie bzw. Sirius-Rot-Färbung bewertet. Die Charakterisierung der C5a/C5aR1-Aktivität und der C5aR1+-Zellen erfolgte durch Multiplex-mRNA-Analyse, ELISA, Immunfluoreszenz-Durchflusszytometrie und In-situ-Hybridisierung in Tiermodellen und Zellkulturen. In den Zellkulturexperimenten konzentrierten wir uns auf die Kommunikation zwischen Makrophagen und Tubuluszellen in Co-Kulturen und ahmten die In-vivo-Bedingungen durch Hypoxie/Reoxygenierung und Supplementierung mit C5a nach. Bereits 6–24 Stunden nach der Induktion von I/R im Rattenmodell war die C5a-Konzentration im Plasma im Vergleich zur Kontrolle signifikant erhöht. Die Matrixkomponenten VIM und α-SMA erreichten am fünften Tag ihren Höchstwert und nahmen nach acht Wochen ab, während mit Sirius Red ein Anstieg des Kollagens festgestellt wurde. Im Gegensatz zur frühen, I/R-induzierten C5a-Aktivierung war die renale C5ar1-Expression am 5. Tag maximal und die C5-Expression stieg bis zur 8. Woche an. Dies deutet darauf hin, dass die renale Hochregulation der Expression für die frühe Komplementaktivierung nicht erforderlich ist. C5aR1-mRNA konnte in Neutrophilen und Makrophagen nachgewiesen werden, jedoch nicht in proximalen Tubuluszellen der geschädigten Nieren. Makrophagen/Tubuluszell-Ko-Kultur-Experimente zeigten, dass Makrophagen hauptsächlich für die erhöhte Expression fibroseassoziierter Gene in Tubuluszellen (ACTA2, VIM, SNAI1, TGFB1 und FGF-2) verantwortlich waren und Hypoxie/Reoxygenierung eine teilweise verstärkende Wirkung hatte. Eine direkte profibrotische Wirkung von C5a wurde nicht beobachtet. Erhöhte TGF-β-Spiegel waren abhängig von der Differenzierung der Makrophagen zum M2-Subtyp. Zusammenfassend lässt sich sagen, dass die frühe Aktivierung mesenchymaler Marker in tubulären Epithelzellen zu einer langfristigen, durch die VIM-Expression gekennzeichneten fibrotischen Umgestaltung führt, die durch TGF-β-abhängige Makrophagen/Tubulus-Wechselwirkungen angetrieben wird. Die chemoattraktiven Eigenschaften von C5a können zur Rekrutierung pro-fibrotischer Makrophagen beitragen

Media coverage of Muslims: Introduction and overview

Existing research largely concurs that coverage of Muslims is negative. Yet this masks how much remains unknown. In particular, there has been no clear or consistent way to gauge precisely how much negativity is present in stories about Muslims. This chapter introduces a systematic way to assess the tone of articles and discusses how this allows for answers to six important questions about coverage of Muslims. The chapter also outlines the structure of the book and summarizes the key findings. In particular, it argues that coverage of Muslims is strikingly negative by every comparative measure examined.https://scholarworks.wm.edu/asbookchapters/1139/thumbnail.jp

Atheism in US and UK Newspapers: Negativity about Non-Belief and Non-Believers

Atheists are among the most disliked “religious” groups in the United States, but the origins of this aversion remain poorly understood. Because the media are an important source of public attitudes, we analyze coverage of atheism and atheists in American and British newspapers. Using computational text analysis techniques, including sentiment analysis and topic modeling, we show that atheism is portrayed negatively by the print media. Significantly, we show that greater negativity is associated with atheism as a concept than with atheists as individuals. Building on this insight, and challenging arguments that prominent atheist intellectuals attract negative coverage, we also find that coverage of famous atheists is actually more positive than that of atheists or atheism in general. Overall, our findings add a new dimension to scholarship on differences between individual-targeted and group-targeted tolerance in public attitudes, establishing for the first time that media coverage mirrors such differences

Media Coverage of Muslim Devotion: A Four-Country Analysis of Newspaper Articles, 1996–2016

Scholars have identified Muslims’ religiosity and faith practices, often believed to be more intense than those of other religious groups, as a point of friction in liberal democracies. We use computer-assisted methods of lexical sentiment analysis and collocation analysis to assess more than 800,000 articles between 1996 and 2016 in a range of British, American, Canadian, and Australian newspapers. We couple this approach with human coding of 100 randomly selected articles to investigate the tone of devotion-related themes when linked to Islam and Muslims. We show that articles touching on devotion are not as negative as articles about other aspects of Islam—and indeed that they are not negative at all, on average, when focused on a key subset of devotion-related articles. We thus offer a new perspective on the perception of Islamic religiosity in Western societies. Our findings also suggest that if newspapers strive to provide a more balanced portrayal of Muslims and Islam within their pages, they may seek opportunities to include more frequent mentions of Muslim devotion

Macrophage-Induced Pro-Fibrotic Gene Expression in Tubular Cells after Ischemia/Reperfusion Is Paralleled but Not Directly Mediated by C5a/C5aR1 Signaling

Ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) is inevitable during kidney transplantation and causes acute kidney injury (AKI), which affects immediate outcome and leads to chronic changes such as fibrotic remodeling of the graft. We investigated pro-fibrotic signaling after I/R, focusing on the complement component and receptor C5a/C5aR1 and macrophage/tubule crosstalk. Male Dark Agouti rats were subjected to I/R and their kidneys were harvested 10 min, 6 h, 24 h, 3 days, 5 days and 8 weeks after reperfusion. The development of renal fibrosis was assessed by the detection of Vimentin (VIM), α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) and collagen by immunohistochemistry and Sirius Red staining, respectively. The characterization of C5a/C5aR1 activity and C5aR1+ cells was performed by multiplex mRNA analysis, ELISA, immunofluorescence flow cytometry and in situ hybridization in animal models and cell culture analyses. In the cell culture experiments, we focused on macrophage/tubule cell crosstalk in co-culture experiments and mimicked in vivo conditions by hypoxia/reoxygenation and supplementation with C5a. Already 6–24 h after the induction of I/R in the rat model, C5a concentration in the plasma was significantly increased compared to the control. The matrix components VIM and α-SMA peaked on day 5 and declined after 8 weeks, when an increase in collagen was detected using Sirius Red. In contrast to early I/R-induced C5a activation, renal C5ar1 expression was maximal at day 5 and C5 expression increased until week 8, indicating that the renal upregulation of expression is not required for early complement activation. C5aR1 mRNA was detected in neutrophils and macrophages, but not in proximal tubular cells in the injured kidneys. The macrophage/tubular cell co-culture experiments showed that macrophages were mainly responsible for the increased expression of fibrosis-associated genes in tubule cells ( ACTA2 , VIM , SNAI1 , TGFB1 and FGF-2 ), and hypoxia/reoxygenation had a partially enhancing effect. A direct pro-fibrotic effect of C5a was not observed. Increased TGF-ß levels were dependent on the differentiation of macrophages to the M2 subtype. In conclusion, the early activation of mesenchymal markers in tubular epithelial cells leads to long-term fibrotic remodeling characterized by VIM expression and driven by TGF-ß-dependent macrophage/tubular crosstalk. The chemoattractive properties of complement C5a may contribute to the recruitment of pro-fibrotic macrophages.This project was funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation)–Project ID: 509149993, TRR 374 C2.Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation

How secularized is Germany? Cohort and comparative perspectives

"The author seeks to answer the question 'How secularized is Germany?' on the basis of different perspectives and databases. The meaning of the term secularization is limited for this study to the decline of religiosity and its consequences, and a distinction is made between church-related and individual religiosity. First, evidence for the decline of church-related religiosity in Germany is presented. Next, it is shown that individual religiosity, i.e. religiosity not necessarily related to organized religion, is also declining. Then the analysis is extended to investigate the relationship between religiosity and non-religious attitudes. Taking two illustrative examples, it is claimed that religion today is far less salient for the way we live and see the world than it has been in the past. Finally, the focus of the analysis is broadened to an international perspective in which Germany is compared with other countries. The author ends with some thoughts on the future of secularization in Germany." (author's abstract

Can Gene Expression Analysis in Zero-Time Biopsies Predict Kidney Transplant Rejection?

Zero-time biopsies are taken to determine the quality of the donor organ at the time of transplantation. Histological analyses alone have so far not been able to identify parameters that allow the prediction of subsequent rejection episodes or graft survival. This study investigated whether gene expression analyses of zero-time biopsies might support this prediction. Using a well-characterized cohort of 26 zero-time biopsies from renal transplant patients that include 4 living donor (LD) and 22 deceased donor (DD) biopsies that later developed no rejection (Ctrl, n = 7), delayed graft function (DGF, n = 4), cellular (T-cell mediated rejection; TCMR, n = 8), or antibody-mediated rejection (ABMR, n = 7), we analyzed gene expression profiles for different types of subsequent renal transplant complication. To this end, RNA was isolated from formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) sections and gene expression profiles were quantified. Results were correlated with transplant data and B-cell, and plasma cell infiltration was assessed by immunofluorescence microscopy. Both principal component analysis and clustering analysis of gene expression data revealed marked separation between LDs and DDs. Differential expression analysis identified 185 significant differentially expressed genes (adjusted p < 0.05). The expression of 68% of these genes significantly correlated with cold ischemia time (CIT). Furthermore, immunoglobulins were differentially expressed in zero-time biopsies from transplants later developing rejection (TCMR + ABMR) compared to non-rejected (Ctrl + DGF) transplants. In addition, immunoglobulin expression did not correlate with CIT but was increased in transplants with previous acute renal failure (ARF). In conclusion, gene expression profiles in zero-time biopsies derived from LDs are markedly different from those of DDs. Pre-transplant ARF increased immunoglobulin expression, which might be involved in triggering later rejection events. However, these findings must be confirmed in larger cohorts and the role of early immunoglobulin upregulation in zero-biopsies needs further clarification